In conventional medical imaging examinations, the protocols of diagnostic scans are usually defined in an initial planning phase. Radiologists then interpret acquired images and send reports to the referring physicians for further diagnosis. There are two major issues within this workflow. First, there is a gap between diagnostic requirements and actual input/output of the scanners. The quality of the scan ultimately depends to a large degree on the expertise of the operator. If the operator lacks expertise, the measurements might not be taken accurately enough to provide sufficient information for a successful diagnosis. The second issue with the workflow is that, although all scanners have a large amount of pre-installed standard protocols and algorithms, these protocols and algorithms are generally not robust enough to apply to all conditions under which scanning is performed. Moreover, it is difficult for the operator/radiologists to adjust settings or search for optimal solutions when facing new requirements.
To address the aforementioned deficiencies, intelligent scanners have been proposed that focus on leveraging post-processing techniques to augment image quality or imaging speed. For example, image fusion techniques in ultrasound can stitch images together and generate larger field-of-view of a target object; registration algorithms can identify the mid-sagittal plane the brain from MR scans and provide consistent geometry of diagnostic scans; motion correction approaches can improve the visualization of the heart by reducing the impact from cardiac motion. However, these developments still highly rely on the expertise of operators to determine protocols and organize workflows. The inputs to the scanners are either rather general, e.g. a fast preliminary scan for all purposes, or dedicated to certain disease/patient, e.g. complex settings designed to image the disease. Modern image scanners are essentially a combination of the conventional image scanning and an additional imaging analyzer.
Accordingly, it is desired to provide a scanning system that does not impose restrictions on providing customized scans for different types of diagnostic requirements, while also not overly relying on the expertise of operators.